The newest entry in the burgeoning genre of behind-the-scenes auto books. Journalist Walton (Deming Management at Work, 1990) here turns to Ford to observe how the company updates its top seller, the Taurus. As in other recent books on automakers designing new models or updating old ones, Waltons approach is fast, jumping from smoky boardrooms to the clay-filled basements where the real design work is done. And her characters, too, take cues from central casting: the aging leader, uncomfortable with women, who takes on one last car; the rising young female exec he clashes with and comes to admire; the rogue designers who want style, no matter what. Walton certainly has fun with her subject and revels in revealing the Dilbert-esque machinations of a large corporation. When one engineer new to the Taurus project tries to get his phone fixed, he discovers that the intricate Ford hierarchy is such that only his supervisor is allowed to make a service call. Another supervisor announces that the black rubber gap hiders universally known as ``gimps'' would now be called ``aeroshields''—though that word has already been chosen to designate another part on the car; much confusion results. The gorier details of the car industry also appeal to Walton, who explains how federal crash regulations were developed using human cadavers. (The testers had just 24 hours to work with the bodies.) The larger story here is well done, and the race between Honda, Ford, and Toyota for market share is fairly interesting. But much of the script is familiar, and the insights amount to little more than that the American spirit of competition, as well as corporate bureaucracy and workplace pettiness, are alive and well. A late entry in a crowded field, but solidly written and reported. (First serial to Fortune)
Pub Date: May 1, 1997
ISBN: 0-393-04080-1
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Norton
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1997
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis...
Privately published by Strunk of Cornell in 1918 and revised by his student E. B. White in 1959, that "little book" is back again with more White updatings.
Stricter than, say, Bergen Evans or W3 ("disinterested" means impartial — period), Strunk is in the last analysis (whoops — "A bankrupt expression") a unique guide (which means "without like or equal").Pub Date: May 15, 1972
ISBN: 0205632645
Page Count: 105
Publisher: Macmillan
Review Posted Online: Oct. 28, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1972
This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)
Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996
ISBN: 0-15-100227-4
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Harcourt
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996
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